If anyone is seeking the UCU rules to pore over - they're here: ucu.org.uk/ucurules (NB regions and branches also have rules agreed locally based on model rules agreed at previous congresses) #UCU2018

(To pre-empt confusion re bits on student members: if you = student working in UCU-able work (eg teaching) you qualify for free full membership under PG membership offer. If a student not working in UCU bargaining remit = 'student member' (also free but not full voting member.)

Want to read the current UCU NEC Standing Orders? I have also checked and they are ok to be shared, but aren't currently online... therefore I have copied and pasted it into a Twitlonger via this tweet:

Related hashtags

Good @USSBriefs thread on #USS HESC yesterday afternoon in Manchester... it was inquorate so advisory+motions will be sent to HEC to deliberate... negotiators do have meetings before then so will need to balance existing @UCU policy with advice/guidance from 91 delegates yday /1

I hope this + results of HESC on Pay + Equality dispute mean extra HEC meeting(s) to avoid squeezing everything into short slot on a larger agenda (of other very important things). To be effective, we need time for focused discussion on enacting motions properly/transparently /2

@ucu *🚿Shower and re-humanify interlude after a LONG day indoors at the (sadly) today unexplored @sim_manchester museum + trains. #unionstrong reps function better after 🚿☕️...*

RESUMING! TL;DR on pay+equality dispute = we're reballoting, but *not* right away: early new year to allow time to regroup+build (understanding+momentum) with commitment to improved resourcing+coordination. Returning to aggregated balloting after long, important discussion /2a

Y’day’s HEC was another packed schedule for 11-430 meeting. Attendance hit by Thur scheduling (unfortunate but probably unavoidable). Loads of important work + pressing Pay+Equality ballot + USS dispute. For the latter 2 we were considering motions to send to the 7 Nov HESCs /2

HEC = Higher Ed members of the National Executive Committee (NEC). We meet regularly between Congresses to enact @ucu policy as decided democratically at annual Congress, and to make 'steering' decisions in line with this. However "HESC" meetings are also policy-forming... /3

Related threads

Many facts have come to light about fraud and crime underpinning the EU referendum. There are at least 11"live" investigations (9 in the UK, one in South Africa and one in the US) with others coming in other countries.
1/17

But what we know thus far, about electoral manipulation, campaign overspend and coordination, data theft, illegal sources of money and possible foreign intervention, may not be the total picture of how the referendum was won.
2/17

Could the vote count have been hacked?
As in: What if the handling of some votes was outsourced?
3/17

Times splash has @oliver_wright report that May's Brexit sherpa Robbins does not think EU will offer a bespoke deal between a narrow FTA & Single Market. Perhaps. This suggests chance of no deal rising or of UK exit on unsustainable terms. Quick thread 👇

2) Last week's EU summit produced no breakthrough. The Commission is playing for time in negotiations. Maltese PM boasted Brexit conclusions done in less than a minute; EU sources in Times say 10 minutes. Either way EU member states are not giving Brexit the focus it requires.

3) EU plan is to push UK into a relationship even closer than Norway’s - in Single Market and a Customs Union. That would be unsustainable in longer-term. Brexit vote itself showed how a relationship with EU that’s not politically sustainable for the UK will unwind.

BREAKING: The White House has said that US President #Trump is canceling his upcoming South America trip to remain in the US "to oversee the American response to Syria." - @NBCNews

This sounds like the US is planning to strike #Syria and Trump will remain in the US to closely monitor responses by #Russia. This is terrible.

BREAKING - British forces are now mobilizing at their bases in #Cyprus for strikes against #Syria. It appears very likely that the US, France and U.K. will strike Syria in the next 24 hours. This is dreadful.

Over the weekend, I have been fixated on trying to understand all that happened in 2014 as key to the current (2018) university pensions crisis #ucustrike#ussstrike. An earlier thread is attached below. #ucustrike#ussstrikes

When I'm not on strike, I usually research by piecing together published, archival & grey literatures to build up a rich tapestry through which to get a grip on shifting phenomena. How do 'objects' & phenomena gain consistency & tractability? How do they change in form?

So here are some of the things (official lit, grey literatures, weblinks, newspaper/magazine articles etc.) that are currently in my "What happened around pensions, USS & UUK in 2014?" folder #ucustrike#ussstrikes

Critically ill Russian national is 66yo Sergei Skripal, former intel colonel/double agent granted refuge in UK after a 2010 "spy swap" between US & Russia. He and a woman were apparently poisoned in/near Salisbury shopping center. bbc.in/2D2oj7X

Ex-Russian spy & daughter 'poisoned' in UK sparks fears of another Kremlin-backed hit. Investigators scrambling to identify the chemical used. Skripal feared for his life after his wife died in a car crash & his son was killed in a road incident.. thesun.co.uk/news/5733372/s…

UK warns Kremlin over poisoning of ex-spy Skripal & his daughter. Recalling Litvinenko murder, FM Johnson said UK was "in the lead across the world" in trying to counteract a "host of malign activity" by Russia.